LETTERS: `TAX MAN' CARNAHAN: GOVERNOR HAS EARNED IT

To the editor:

Gov. Mel Carnahan has fooled us again. This time he fooled us with Amendment 4. Earlier he fooled us on Proposition A and with his massive attack on Hancock II.

In the beginning there was Senate Bill 380, in which he fooled us with the $310 million state income tax increase. You may have noticed last December that this forced local school districts to increase our property taxes to receive their part of the state income tax increase.

Here are few facts we can expect from Amendment 4. The $50 million "lid" is indexed, so the amount by which our taxes can be raised without a vote increases each year.

A popular vote is required only if a tax generates too much revenue in the first year. Thereafter, if the tax goes over the lid, it isn't subject to a vote.

Licenses may be increased without a vote. The lid applies only to taxes and fees.

More important, we taxpayers are denied our former, pre-Amendment 4 right to challenge violations of the lid in the Missouri Supreme Court. Only the state's top six elected officials will be permitted to do so.

Earlier taxes scheduled to expire can now be extended without a vote. Finally, there is absolutely no protection from the state's exempting taxes passed under this lid from the overall Hancock Amendment tax lid (Hancock I).

I think the governor has earned the title "Tax Man Carnahan." Let's remember his record on taxes and health care, among others, and show him how well term limits really work at the ballot box next November.

THOMAS F. FITZPATRICK

Warrensburg